Popular retail brokerage firms entered a price war on stock/ETF trading commissions. Schwab started the war by reducing commissions from $9 to $7 in early February. Others soon followed. Schwab retaliated by a second cut to $5.

Prices (as of March 9th), published on public web sites are:

Brokerage Price ($)

E*Trade 7

Fidelity 5

Merrill Edge 7

Schwab 5

Scottrade 7

TD Ameritrade 7

T.Rowe Price 10

USAA 9

Vanguard 7

Balancing Act users should update the "Fee Schedule" window to reflect these changes. This is also a good time to remember that the Fee Schedule supports more complex fee structures, for various trade types. It also supports custom asset types. For example, some Schwab ETFs trade with no fee while ETFs incur the standard fee.

See http://www.statespacetech.com/selfhelp/fee-schedule for full Fee Schedule details.